Couple weeks ago someone asked me why I don’t have a riving knife on my saw. That’s a great question considering that I suffered an injury from a blade bind about 15 years ago that easily could have been fatal. I was using all of the proper cutting techniques when a piece of ash pinched the blade and bogged down the saw, and then the whole thing exploded sending several large fragments into my face. One piece bounced off my safety glasses, and the other piece lodged in my forehead knocking me back about 8 feet and onto the ground. And then, of course, because we live in the United States where you have to pay a small fortune for an ambulance ride, I drove myself to the hospital, losing massive amounts of blood. My car and the area around my saw it looked like a murder scene but I did come home with a really cool Harry Potter scar that has since faded.
This was back in 2005 before riving knifes were required on saws sold in America. back then your saw came with a integrated splitter and blade guard that was ineffective at best and dangerous at worst. So we removed them.
These days I’m still running older tablesaws without riving knives, but I do find myself wondering if there is something that could work for me. Biggest issue that I have is that I’m constantly switching between different diameter blades and different thickness blades for different tasks. For example, in this video I’m using a thin kerf 7 1/4 inch diameter blade. Are riving knife assemblies universal these days or are they different depending on the manufacturer? Also, does anybody make a set of knives to work with different diameter blades of different thicknesses in conjunction with the system that’s relatively easy to change out?
I thought about incorporating a knife into the insert, but that wouldn’t be vertically adjustable, and it seems like if something like that were to blow up on you, you’d be standing right in the line of fire of an ultra high velocity Chinese throwing star.
I probably don’t have the cash to upgrade but I’m just curious, what the state of riving knife technology is these days?
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